There's been quite a change to how you progress through levels. Previously they made 50-56 easier, and then this recent patch were making the 59-61 lesser as well. There's also been recent changes that enable significantly more silvers (like 100s of millions) through quests, and are also many more changes and new items that drop (Asula set in Mediah areas), or you receive through quests (like mid 30 gears -and a lvl 50 to 54 set of off hand & main armor).

There is still a lot of content, and also grinding, but honestly what drives the majority of people away is the enhancement of gear. Past 58, and with TRI gear being so difficult to enhance it really tends to make everything at that level very counter-productive. For $6 though there's a ton of content, and casual life skills things to putter around with, and is what I'd mostly done.

This week however isn't a particularly good one to buy the game or return though, because the two most recent patches have included some sort of change in their net code that seems to be making connections extremely unstable. The servers were mostly crowded prior to Halloween, but since this weds it's been barely any population, with 1-3 showing Crowded and most channels empty on NA server. There's lots of forum threads and an announcement about "ISP issues" but I am kinda convinced (from my own instability) that the game changed how it transmitted to the client which is presenting itself mostly as connection problems.

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Progress is incredibly fast now. Maybe too fast, but considering how grindy the game would be otherwise I think it all feels right at the moment. It rains XP and money, and as a result the grind at least until the late 50s is completely optional.

I haven't had any problem with disconnections or crowded servers anyway. It is also worth noting that there are many "servers" but they are just instances of the some ONE server. Which is great because you can pick if you want to see a lot of people moving around you (crowded server) or just enjoy the content for yourself without having to fight for resources.

Progress is incredibly fast now. Maybe too fast, but considering how grindy the game would be otherwise I think it all feels right at the moment. It rains XP and money, and as a result the grind at least until the late 50s is completely optional.

See, but up until last Thursday, every channel was routinely showing "Crowded", excepting the head-start/boost servers (Olvia). Since the update the connection issues have dramatically trimmed much of the populations, and of course I speak of this from personal experience since I can't remain in the game for more than a few minutes in cities where players congregate. There wasn't really "crowding" but there's definitely a much lower count of afk people in major cities, and less overall populations than just 2 weeks ago.

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I haven't had any problem with disconnections or crowded servers anyway. It is also worth noting that there are many "servers" but they are just instances of the some ONE server. Which is great because you can pick if you want to see a lot of people moving around you (crowded server) or just enjoy the content for yourself without having to fight for resources.

The way they designed channels make it really easy to just avoid most PVP if you want to, but there still really aren't many places to go toward the higher levels, which does end up leading to competition for "camps".. Now though, it's more about "rotations", where a solo player or group will claim a series of spawns that they rotate through, and some people will pvp you just for being near "their" mobs.

I personally like many things about the game, especially the variety of casual lifeskills or things to do. The combat is very smooth and satisfying feeling, but it definitely does a number on my carpal tunnel if I combat grind too much. I also am not trying to make it to max level because of that wrist/finger pain, and instead do little bits of combat combined with many hours of the game doing things while minimized (cooking, leveling horses, processing, etc.).

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DK and Striker are both very good with PvE, and have some nice combos and abilities that make them easy to progress with and that damage large groups of mobs (AoE). Striker right now is slightly OP, even after a slight nerf to their accuracy in the recent update. Striker kind of is the meta now, and in PvP they are one of the classes that can compete against witches/wizards (which was the previous PvP meta class).

Ninja (and sister class Kuno) is a very mobile and fast class, more about quick stealth attacking at melee range and then using evades to return back to range. I personally like this class, but it definitely isn't as easy to clear mobs in PvE as a DK, Striker, or witch/wiz can. They also aren't great at PvP except maybe in a support capacity.

The Valk is a class I really want to like, and supposed to be a tanky damage dealing class, but right now their accuracy and AoE ability just doesn't stack up to some other classes. A well geared Valk is maybe able to sustain PvP with their tankiness but I really wouldn't consider them unless you really like their combos and abilities. They also seem to not really open up many AoE and massive damage attacks until post Awakening (after lvl 56) when their weapon goes from Longsword to Lancia.

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Basics are, in top left near "Level" are 3 bars. Top is combat experience, middle is energy, bottom is contribution. Across the top of the screen is bar for progress through the Level. You get Energy exp from knowledge and quests, you get contribution exp from questing or turn ins of by products from professions.

You use contribution points to "invest" in nodes across the map (by visiting node mgr) or in buildings in towns (can buy cp things of towns anyplace using map). Linking nodes allows you to get distance bonuses with trade and send workers to linked nodes to collect items (great for some passive income). Town buildings also allow for creating items (armor, tools, weapons) or trade crates, etc with workers, or can be turned into lodgings, residence or storage space.

If you open the P (professions) panel it has experience bars for all the different types of lifeskills toward the bottom. Life skills are mainly where you'll spend energy. Gathering is basically all the tools at General vendors (lumbering axe, pickaxe, etc). Leveling lifeskill Gather you have a higher chance to not spend energy gathering, as well as more things or count of things you receive. Mining after artisan for example you would get not only rough stone, and metals, but a slight chance for gold, gems, or the like.

Other things you can spend energy on are rolling workers, doing mini games, using Channel chat (1 energy per msg lol), or going to the "Night vendors" in cities to sell 50 energy to get a possible item buy chance (great for some black stones now). You also can bottle energy, but only from Alustin in Velia.

The leveling of other stats in your Professions panel, Like Health, Stamina, and Strength, are also things you should consider progressing. Strength will help you carry more, and can be leveled using a trade pack auto loop, and Health increases your overall health/mana pools (increased by eating foods). Stamina is "Breath" experience, which is basically running with shift held down all the time (and maybe in loops). There's also mini games for some of these too. ;)

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So I caved and bought this because it was $5 on Steam. Holy shit is this thing dense, throws a ton of shit at you and doesn't explain hardly ANY of it. I I facerolled to level 13 kind of picking it up as I go. I'm going to assume leveling speed slows down a little but I don't assume I'll be told much about what the fuck I'm supposed to do.

So I caved and bought this because it was $5 on Steam. Holy shit is this thing dense, throws a ton of shit at you and doesn't explain hardly ANY of it. I I facerolled to level 13 kind of picking it up as I go. I'm going to assume leveling speed slows down a little but I don't assume I'll be told much about what the fuck I'm supposed to do.

There are quests around nodes, professions, etc. Leveling is fast but lvl's are not essential part of this game. Grind is :)

Hameish, leveling does not slow down much. Sure, it's not one kill = one level as in the beginning, but it stays steady fast for about 50 levels.

It is SUPER dense. The fact that it makes so many things in different ways from all previous MMORPGs is the biggest hurdle and also its biggest strength if you ask me. Finding out stuff is fun. Especially when you can just ignore it and simply level up by melting mobs if you so prefer.

Hameish, leveling does not slow down much. Sure, it's not one kill = one level as in the beginning, but it stays steady fast for about 50 levels.

It is SUPER dense. The fact that it makes so many things in different ways from all previous MMORPGs is the biggest hurdle and also its biggest strength if you ask me. Finding out stuff is fun. Especially when you can just ignore it and simply level up by melting mobs if you so prefer.

Actually the leveling slows down to a trickle since there is no level cap but the grind needed to advance past certain point is insane (luckily the start is easy and most will get bored of leveling before the real grind begins... though the grind to upgrade eq is just as bad)

It's real disconcerting to level in fact because unlike every other MMORPG I've ever played, leveling doesn't even feel like it's happening. Like the game doesn't even really celebrate it. And this horrible UI just layers shit on top of shit all over the screen so it's hard to even know what the fuck happened. Also, goddamn but I hate the text font on all the buttons. It's like 1998 LCD font that has no weight and looks unprofessional as all get out. However, I am intrigued enough that I'll be delving in some more so it hasn't completely failed.

Yes, everything you buy with real money (Pearl items) can be sold in the game auction house for fake money (silver).

Ah that's good.

At this point I'm focused on customization, and how someone who looks great in the creation screens can look like Daffy Duck when you first enter the world. From what I've gathered, the Value Pack enables unlimited trips to the salon? And there's loyalty points to buy a day's worth of this?

The way I see it, they are doing a really good job in helping late comers. Quests COVER you in money, and daily log in bonus are pretty serious. I am sure someone would disagree cause - after all - end game weapons cost 800.000.000, but who cares? It is true that level up slows down until an impossible crawl after level 60, but it flows incredibly fast up to that point thanks to the many gifts you get from different sources.

Yes, everything you buy with real money (Pearl items) can be sold in the game auction house for fake money (silver).

While this is theoretically true, there are two problems. The first is that there is no direct trading, only the AH which has a hard cap on what things can be sold for. Second, players can set alerts for when certain items are listed on the AH, which means that when a popular Pearl item is listed it's sold instantly because 100s of players want it.

Yes, everything you buy with real money (Pearl items) can be sold in the game auction house for fake money (silver).

While this is theoretically true, there are two problems. The first is that there is no direct trading, only the AH which has a hard cap on what things can be sold for. Second, players can set alerts for when certain items are listed on the AH, which means that when a popular Pearl item is listed it's sold instantly because 100s of players want it.

So..

You can sell Pearl "Outfits", Pets or "Value Packs" for silvers. You cannot sell outfits tho if you've worn them (and you can't sell as a "package" if you've removed from the set box ) and using pets also means can resell their "tokens". The majority of other pearl items also get locked to characters (weight etc) and the items/buffs are tradable to ur alts using storage. You can also gift pearl items to other players when buying them.

The auction house for Pearl outfits is around 37 million for most "Premium" sets (meaning has awakened), around 29 for Classic (no awaken weap), and some outfits only 20-22 million (if they don't have boots, gloves, or helm as pieces). Value packs sell for 14.5 million on Auction house.

I've had a Value Pack running since they started Marketplace sales of Pearl items last September, and have gotten all of them from the auction house.

The UI does take some time to grow on you, and it mostly is after you customize it from "default" that it actually becomes evident how good it is. One of the tiles on the "Escape" menu is "Edit UI" and this allows you to move all the panes around (+ now they're detachable from the game too), or change their sizes -even turn some panes completely off. Disabling things in options also helps, like the on screen notifications of sales (+everything) which is default to on -despite how annoying and laggy this makes the game.

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At this point I'm focused on customization, and how someone who looks great in the creation screens can look like Daffy Duck when you first enter the world. From what I've gathered, the Value Pack enables unlimited trips to the salon? And there's loyalty points to buy a day's worth of this?

The Value Pack allows you to alter you character via the looks (creation) menu, and also to freely dye all the colors of armor outift (Merv's Palette). Any character change stays permanent if the Value pack expires. Loyalty purchase of a Character Custimization coupon would allow change of character creation look, and Merv's palette for the dyes.

Those are kind of expensive for purchase with Loyalties, and I'd recommend either using loyalty for storage space or inventory/weight, or saving Loyalties for additional character slots for your account..

Alts actually share your family "knowledge", energy pool, and contribution empire/storage, and since armor is inter-changeable it's easy to swap around testing each class for feel and which you enjoy or like the effects/combos of. Only thing new classes would need would be weapons.

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You definitely want to spend 5 dollars on a pet. Or two. Or three. They are the only way to collect all the loot you drop at a decent speed. Get the pets. No really. Do it now. Get the pets. They just make the game flow properly and more enjoyable.

On the "game" tab, under Settings (the cog wheel at the bottom right, or the tile on Esc Settings) there's a section for "Turn off system Notifications". This is the hovering on screen ones, and I only have "Combat/Safe Zone" and "Nearby Monster" on mine (so all but those two are checked).

Also can turn of certain types of chat too, to eliminate this spam taking over your chat (by clicking the cog on chat tabs, and filtering out the "System" messages). This way can remove the market chat spam for those, or only add them to a single chat tab.

« Last Edit: November 26, 2017, 05:28:50 AM by taolurker »

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I hit level 23 on a Musa and have started trying to set up some kind of trading operation. It's interesting but I'm really thinking that I'm not going to make it too much farther. It's so goddamn dense with all the crafting and seventy-billion different types of experience/grinding. The contribution and node thing is odd. The fact that I tend to dabble and then get bored with crafting in other MMOG's and this one being so focused on crafting something, I don't know how much longer my patience can hold out.

The combat, once you get the idea, is actually the best part of the game. I just don't think I'm going to have the patience to get to the PVP.

Even if you did get to the PvP, you'd hate it. There's absolutely zero balance to anything, with certain classes really being near invulnerable, with 1 level meaning 30% of your attacks miss, and how the gear disparity is HUGE (even if levels are identical). A level 58 will always have a decided advantage against a 57, and be nearly damage resistant to anyone 56 or lower. The battlefields and PvP ganking you're likely to experience isn't all that fun, and I feel like is best avoided in this game (IMO).

There's also very little about the node wars that is really appealing either (IMO), because of how heavily the Zerg mechanic becomes the norm, and the PvP issues can result in completely imbalanced contests with lots of wasted resources building siege emplacements.

The lifeskills and making a node empire is supposed to keep you creating passive income and have more to do (level) for the sheer quantity of time it's going to take enhancing (+failing/downgrading) items to get you near to competitive near levels 58/59. The lifeskills are also something that mostly can be done while afk (+ minimizing the game) and are best done when you've done "actively playing", where instead of closing the game for the night you leave it open gathering/processing/cooking/looping horses.

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The combat, once you get the idea, is actually the best part of the game.

This is why I continue to play, and I actually enjoy combatting/leveling, but I also do it only in small bursts while doing a lot of passive or afk things in between (a lot of this is also my carpal tunnel pain keeping combat as sporadic limited time sessions). There's plenty of content and enjoyment to be had, especially the more you enjoy everything that's not combat. Me, I like doing mini games (milking cows or catching horses mostly) too and think that the more casually you play, the less the enchantment and level pain will disparage you.

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I think I'm with Haemish at this point. I've made several characters and brought them to Heidel. Everything is bearable and many things actually very interesting. Combat amazing.

Seems very reliant on being with a guild and putting in a lot of time, which would've been perfect for me in 2004.

But here's the thing that stood out: when someone holds a node or outpost or whatever, they can put whatever picture they want on the banner? There are several spots with the emblem being a close up of some random dude's face, like the player took a selfie with a cheap cam. Talk about immersion breaking. Here I felt like someone broke into my house irl and sat on my couch while I played BDO.